The Basketball Feelings Podcast, Episode 12: Holly MacKenzie

I have to tell you, as you started leading into this, I genuinely had to put my hand to my heart.

Holly MacKenzie is probably the first person I recognized, before I’d even met her, as a kindred spirit in terms of how she viewed and approached basketball. Joy, empathy, compassion, patience, those are her main things, plus being very, very smart about the game at every level. When I did meet Holly, I was relieved and thrilled to learn that’s how she approaches most everything.

Which is why I had wanted to have Holly as a guest specifically when it came to talking about rookies. Previous guest Kelly Dwyer gave a timely, teaser prompt (thanks Kelly) when he said Holly was the one who made him realize rookies “choose you” when it comes to your favourites, so we talked about her origins for that, the illogical timeline for rookies to have constant unilateral development, and the pressure on a rookie to mitigate their joy and lightness in order to be “competitive”.

We also talked about DeMar DeRozan — who Holly’s covered since his draft year — getting the season he deserves and the work it took, how she got into covering basketball for work, being a woman in predominantly male spaces (hello, unsolicited advice from dudes!) and the tiniest, personal things we love about being so close to the game.